FertilehealthyAiming for success, not perfection…

We recently watched the movie “The Dish” again.  I really recommend it if you haven’t seen it.  It’s about the largest antenna in the southern hemisphere, situated in Parkes, Australia, and the role it played in relaying the images and transmissions from the first moon landing.  It’s very funny, but more than that, it reminded me again what an enormous feat putting a man on the moon was.

Here’s the trailer:

One of the songs in the movie is this one, and it’s been making me happy ever since…

C’mon people now,
Smile on your brother
Ev’rybody get together
Try and love one another right now
Right now
Right now!

Do you ever feel that you are simply doomed to fail?  Or if not exactly “doomed”, then certainly “more than likely” to fail?

I used to believe that.  I wasn’t conscious of that fact, but yes, that was my belief and it had a few friends – “I’m not good enough”, “I don’t deserve…”, “I’m a quitter”, “I’m fundamentally flawed” and “I can’t…”.

My life seemed like an endless string of failures.  The more hopeless I felt, the less I was inclined to try something new, to take risks.  What would be the point?  I’d only get hurt, hurt someone else, fail, end up worse off, get rejected or DIE.  So I stayed where I was, stewing in my negative beliefs and never accomplishing much.  Is it any wonder that my life felt empty?

William Shakespeare said: “Our doubts are traitors.  They make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.”

As I’m uncovering and addressing my deepest beliefs, I am starting to see just how I’d derailed my efforts to lose weight in the past.

Let’s face it, weighing 345 pounds – my starting weight – makes one feel like a massive failure!

But when I examined the process that got me there, I discovered to my surprise that my fat did not signify failure.  I am not a failure.  On the contrary, I am a huge, unmitigated success.  I had, through my consistent actions over a period of time, successfully produced the result of being fat.  Outcome-based living, if you will.

Of course, I reached a point where the result of my actions, or lifestyle, no longer pleased me.  I didn’t want to be fat anymore.  I set myself the task of getting thin.  What needed to happen then was that I had to become as successful, if not more so, at slimming down than I’d been at gaining weight.  To produce that result, I had to change my beliefs, my actions, the way I lived my life.

Simply regarding my excess weight as failure immobilized me.  By changing it to a success, I could envision success of a different kind.  I can now allow myself to be empowered by success and refuse to be cowed by failure.

Of course, it would help if I could find more evidence of success in my past.  So, I decided to start at the beginning and I didn’t have to look very hard before I found it.

There was a time when I couldn’t walk.  But nature planted the desire to walk in me, and one day, after having pulled myself to my feet, like I’d been doing for a while, I let go of the coffee table and took a few teetering steps.  And then I fell down.

There was much excitement in our house that day.  Nobody paid the least attention to the fact that I’d only walked about three steps, or that I’d in fact fallen.  The buzz was all about the fact that I had walked.  They were so proud! At the same time, the falls didn’t deter me from getting back on my feet and trying again.  Today I can walk fine, and I very rarely stumble or fall.

So, I can no longer claim that I always fail.  These are just two of my successes.  There are many more.

Sure, when it comes to slimming down, I had often failed to produce the correct outcome, but all those “failures” gave me a benefit and an asset I didn’t have before.  Experience.  When you have experience, you can apply it to effect a better outcome next time.

Refuse to ever use the term “failure” again about yourself, or anybody else for that matter.  You didn’t fail, you only produced a result.  If the result is not to your liking, adjust your aim and try again.

Success will be yours!

It was World Diabetes Day last Saturday and  it generated quite a lot of discussion in the blogging world.  Yet, in most cases, the emphasis was on managing diabetes, not reversing it.

The problem with managing diabetes is that diabetes is a degenerative disease, meaning that it gets worse and worse over time.  That means more drugs, more symptoms and more related diseases.  The cost over a few decades can be astronomical and you will still have diabetes.

Why do we develop diabetes?  In a nutshell because we live a lifestyle that supports diabetes.  When you take away the things (foods and habits) that diabetes needs in order to exist and thrive in a body, you cure diabetes.

Sure, it requires change to cure diabetes and some people would rather die (literally) than change.  Chances are your doctor will tell you that diabetes can’t be cured, but you have to remember that he is singing the pharmaceutical industry’s tune, since they largely determined what he learned at medical school.

The truth is that many, many people cure their diabetes in a relatively short period of time by changing their diet and lifestyle.

Visit Dr. Joel Fuhrman’s website and read the testimonials.  People who adopt his Eat to Live plan usually see huge improvements within the first week and full reversal in a few weeks.

Then there is Dr. Gabriel Cousens, who uses raw food to cure diabetes.  Watch this trailer for the movie Simply Raw, where a group of diabetics reversed their diabetes within 30 days with raw foods.

You can also listen to this audio recording of an interview with Dr. Cousens where he discusses reversing diabetes.

Of course, when you change your life in this way, it’s not only diabetes that gets cured… You will be healthier in every conceivable way.

Not everyone will want to change their lives in this way.  That is okay – we are all on our own paths and responsible for our own selves.  But I do believe that people should be informed that there are alternatives to managing diabetes so that they can make the choice for themselves.  As I said, you are unlikely to hear this from your doctor, which means that he is robbing you of your right to choose how you want to live your life.

I was very touched by this video from Dr Oz’s show.  I have to admit that, had I met Rocco before this, I would never have pegged him for someone who would be willing to change in this way.  Dr. Oz presented him with a choice and this most unlikely character did something amazing and turned his health around in 28 days.  If you haven’t seen this clip, do watch it.  Watch his face when he hears the unvarnished truth about his health… for him it was truly a moment of  truth.

So, diabetes doesn’t have to be managed.  You can reverse it.  The choice is yours.

About 10 years ago I worked with a rather strange girl who, when the day was especially fraught and hectic, would say, “I think I’ll have a good cry when I get home this evening“.

Our boss used to mock that statement (behind her back), saying that it’s stupid to schedule a cry.  Always anxious for approval, I would echo the sentiment.  The girl was obviously one sandwich short of a picnic.

I was wrong. She may well have been emotionally healthier than the rest of us.

Crying is probably one of the most misunderstood and under-utilized skills in our emotional tool chest.

From a very young age, whether we are male or female, our caregivers and the people around us expend a lot of energy trying to prevent us from crying or get us to stop crying.  Eventually we get the message that crying is “bad” and we miss out on the healing properties of tears.  In the process we learn to suppress and disconnect from our emotions and we develop alternative coping strategies, like acting out, eating for comfort and later on drinking too much,  smoking, using drugs and compulsive behaviors.

Of course some people use tears as a way to manipulate and emotionally blackmail others.  I’m not condoning that kind of behavior, but I do believe that we need to learn to cry again to express our sadness, frustration, anger and pain.  Not necessarily in the moment, which may not be appropriate, but like my ex-colleague, a little later, when we’re in a safe environment.

A while ago I attended a workshop on eating disorders and the keynote speaker, an ex-anorexic, explained that her healing could only really begin once she had cried her heart out.  It took her almost a week, but she cried and cried until there was nothing left to cry about.

Scientists have found that emotional tears differ vastly from the tears we cry when cutting an onion or walking in the wind.  They are filled with the chemicals of our emotions and the act of shedding them releases the emotions and detoxifies our bodies.  Tears are good for us!

Before I married Craig I rarely cried.   But in him I found someone who is not uncomfortable when I cry.  In fact, he will hold me for as long as I need to cry, without trying to get me to stop.  And when I’m done, having released the emotions, I can usually discuss the issue or problem in a rational and solution-driven way.   It’s amazing how well this works!  I really believe that this is why we don’t fight with each other.

As I delve deeper into my core-beliefs and the emotions that surround them, I find that like the ex-anorexic, I need to sometimes just have a good cry.  I’m shedding decades’ worth of tears (in private – this is after all MY healing journey).   Rest assured, it’s not a daily event.  It’s just that when I read something that resonates with me, I know that I need to release those emotions and I don’t force it, I just allow myself to feel the pain and sorrow and let the tears come.   I always feel cleansed and “lighter” afterwards.

Some might say that crying is about wallowing and feeling sorry for oneself.  There is an element of that, but I find that I move through that into healing quite quickly.  That’s another misconception – that it’s somehow wrong to feel sorry for ourselves.  What’s wrong is being stuck there.

I truly believe that crying is helping me heal.

What about you? Have you discovered the healing properties of tears yet?

To give yourself permission to cry is to bless your body with the benediction of healing. ~ Sarah Ban Breathnach

We all need the waters of the Mercy River. Though they don’t run deep, there’s usually enough, just enough, for the extravagance of our lives. ~ Jonis Agee

One of my favorite movies is Under the Tuscan Sun.  I love everything about it, but especially the part where Frances bemoans the fact that she’s renovating a house for a life she doesn’t have.  Signor Martini tells her:

Signora, between Austria and Italy, there is a section of the Alps called the Semmering. It is an impossibly steep, very high part of the mountains. They built a train track over these Alps to connect Vienna and Venice. They built these tracks even before there was a train in existence that could make the trip. They built it because they knew some day, the train would come.

So often we tell ourselves that we will love and appreciate ourselves when we are “good enough”.  When we’ve slimmed down, toned our bodies and can run 5K.  Then we’ll be worthy of love and appreciation.  Then we’ll be acceptable.  Then we’ll be healthy.  Then our lives will have meaning and purpose.  Then we’ll tackle the relationships that don’t work, change jobs, find love.  Then we’ll be happy.

We want to see the train before we build an inch of track.

It doesn’t work like that.  We have only today.  Right now.  If you aren’t loving yourself where are now and living the life you want in this moment, chances are you never will, regardless of whether you lose 100 pounds or run a marathon.  Your fat or your health aren’t holding you back.  Your beliefs and fears are.

Health problems, infertility, excess weight, addictions – these are just some of the symptoms of a life out of balance.

Unfortunately, in the last century we have bought into a medical system that is all about treating symptoms and we have forgotten the meaning and importance of healing.  The truth is that if you suppress or treat a symptom instead of the underlying cause, another symptom will pop up, weight will pile back on, or another addiction will develop.

I have come to appreciate that just about everything that can and does go wrong in the human body has a large emotional connection.  That doesn’t mean that nutrition and lifestyle don’t play a role – they are vitally important – but at the center of just about every health issue you will find fear, erroneous beliefs, rage, guilt, low self-esteem, lack of forgiveness, resentment, etc.

Yesterday I posted a video about affirmations and positive self-talk.  People often tell me that affirmations don’t work.  Well, of course they won’t work if you repeat a few positive statements you don’t really believe for an hour a day, but then spend the other 23 hours telling yourself what a failure you are, that you couldn’t possibly change, that you’re stupid, ugly, fat, lazy, weak, unacceptable or that good things never happen to you.  Actually, this proves that they DO work!  Where you are today is a direct result of your thoughts and beliefs of the past.  Where you will be tomorrow is a direct result of what you think and tell yourself today and every day in the future.

I was very intimidated by the idea that I had to create a positive life for myself (this includes freedom from emotional pain and self-defeating patterns, perfect health, the correct weight, fitness, etc.) through my thoughts.  The task just seemed so daunting.  Then it dawned on me that I have all the tools and skills.  I created the life and body I have now!  It was a monumental task, but I did it!  And I can do it again.

Of course, the life I have now was created for a purpose, based on stinking thinking.  A lot of it was subconscious, which is why I’m working so hard to reprogram my subconscious mind.  You can’t just tape over the old messages though, you have to erase them, which means bringing them to light.  I thought it was going to be horrendous, painful and ugly.  Instead it’s been… well, interesting.  The memories that have surfaced (apparently our core beliefs and wounds are acquired by the age of 12) have been fascinating and where I thought I would be horrified, I’ve actually been relieved to realize what – often innocuous – events led to a certain mindset that would create a pattern of behavior in me.  I thought forgiveness would be hard, but not only have I found forgiveness, but I’ve found compassion – for myself and the other players in my life drama.  So often I have seen that “it” wasn’t even about me!

Our efforts to suppress our feelings, memories and emotions through stoicism, cynicism, substances, habits, behaviors, food, etc. actually rob us of so much – health, happiness, freedom and our vital life-force.  Truly, it’s easier to deal with the issues as they come up and move forward in our lives than to keep repeating the old patterns.

So, are you ready to start laying the tracks to your new life today?

PS.  One of the things that I’ve come to appreciate about the high raw, predominantly plant-based lifestyle is that it detoxes both mind and body (remember, the two are not separate).  Somehow this restores life-force to the body, which has great implications for health and vitality.  And the healthier the body, the better it functions, meaning that the body itself will strive toward its own perfect weight and balance.  A healthy body has no need for excess weight!